This Day In History December 18

Frances Dean, the pinup girl? That name doesn’t have quite the same ring to it as Betty Grable, Hollywood’s most universally-known star and archetypal pinup girl of the 1940s. She was really named Ruth Elizabeth Grable when she was born on this day in 1916 in St. Louis, Missouri. Somehow she got to Hollywood where she attended the Hollywood Professional School at the tender age of 12. Within three years, Sam Goldwyn signed the young chorus girl to a movie contract and changed her name to Frances Dean.

Frances played bit parts for Goldwyn in such movies as Whoopee!, Hold ’Em Jail and Probation; but before he could turn her into a star, RKO picked up her contract and changed her name back to Betty Grable.

The movie roles got bigger: The Gay Divorcee and Follow the Fleet being the most memorable; however, Grable was still a starlet looking for true stardom. In 1937, she and Paramount found each other, and Grable and Jackie Coogan found each other, too, in pictures (College Swing) and in love. Their marriage was short-lived, lasting only three years. Suddenly the financial troubles that plagued their marriage turned into financial success for Betty.

Darryl F. Zanuck with Fox Studios needed someone to compete with Alice Faye. Betty Grable was the perfect choice. The audience loved her refreshing good looks and her lovely legs became the talk of the town. Technicolor and musicals were the perfect venue. Ms. Grable was soon a top box-office draw. Down Argentine Way, Tin Pan Alley, Moon Over Miami, Song of the Islands, Springtime in the Rockies and Sweet Rosie O’Grady were just a few of the flicks that prompted the insuring of her famous legs (Lloyds of London held the policy for somewhere between a quarter million and a million dollars). All of this resulted in the U.S. Treasury Department’s 1946-47 report, noting that she was the highest paid woman in America, receiving $300,000 a year.

Her 1943 marriage to trumpet-player/bandleader Harry James lasted 22 years. Unfortunately, the popularity of musical movies didn’t last as long and Betty Grable’s popularity declined. However, she will always be remembered as the WWII GIs’ #1 pinup girl.

Events December 18

1787 - This is the day when New Jersey was counted as the third state to enter the United States of America. Where is old Jersey, you ask? Well, in 1664, when the British colonized the area, they named New Jersey after Jersey, one of the British Channel Islands. New Jersey’s many truck farms, orchards and flower gardens gave the state its nickname: The Garden State. Trenton, the capital of New Jersey, and once the capital of the new nation, was the locale of Washington’s famous Revolutionary war victory. He turned the tide when he led his forces across the Delaware River at Trenton. The New Jersey state flower is the purple violet, the state Bird , the eastern goldfinch, and the state motto: "Liberty and Prosperity."

1796 - On this day the Sunday Monitor of Baltimore, Maryland was published as the first Sunday newspaper. There were no comics, incidentally, as they hadn’t been invented yet. And there was no color. And there wasn’t much in sports coverage, as the Orioles weren’t invented yet. And there were no Colts and, certainly, no Ravens.

1862 - The first orthopedic hospital was organized -- in New York City. It was called the Hospital for Ruptured and Crippled. It hurts just to say it.

1865 - “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, save as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist in the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” With these words, slavery was abolished in the United States. On this day a proclamation by the U.S. Secretary of State announced the thirteenth amendment to the Constitution had been ratified by the legislatures of twenty-seven of the thirty-six states. Actual ratification was completed on December 6, but news travelled slowly in those days.

1920 - Conductor Arturo Toscanini made his first recording for Victor Records in Camden, New Jersey.

1934 - Willie Smith sang with Jimmy Lunceford and his orchestra on Rhythm is Our Business on Decca Records (serial number 369 A).

1935 - A $1 silver certificate was issued. It was the first currency to depict the front and back sides of the Great Seal of the United States.

1936 - Su Lin arrived in San Francisco, California. She was the first giant panda to come to the U.S. from China. The bear was sold to the Brookfield Zoo for $8,750.

1941 - Japanse troops landed in Hong Kong. British and Canadian defenders fought back as best they could, grimly holding on to their positions and counterattacking repeatedly, but Hong Kong surrendered on Christmas Day 1941.

1942 - Beau Jack defeated Tippy Larkin in New York City. Beau beat Tippy to a pulp to win the New York Lightweight Boxing Championship.

1944 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the army’s removal of Japanese-Americans from the West Coast early in 1942 was constitutional at the time it was carried out, but that citizens must be permitted to return to their homes when their loyalty to U.S. was established. The tribunal acted in two cases. It upheld constitutionality of the removal program by a 6 to 3 decision, and was unanimous in holding that loyal citizens should be released. The ruling came one day after the war department announced that loyal citizens of Japanese ancestry would be permitted to return to their former homes after 33 months of enforced absence in relocation centers.

1944 - The U.S. destroyers Hull, Monaghan and Spence sank in Typhoon Cobra (as it was later named) in the Phillipines. 778 men died.

1956 - One of America’s great panel shows debuted on CBS-TV. BUD Collyer, bow tie and all, hosted To Tell the Truth. The program enjoyed a 10-year run and made even bigger stars of panelists: Phyllis Newman, Orson Bean, Kitty Carlisle (Hart), Sam Levinson, Tom Poston, Milt Kamen and Bess Myerson. The announcer: Johnny Olson. The show was a Mark Goodson-Bill Todman Production.

1957 - Shippingport Atomic Power Station, Pennsylvania was the first commercial central electric-generating station in the United States to use nuclear energy. It started producing juice this day, feeding electricity into the grid for the Pittsburgh area. On December 2, 1977, the first U.S. light water breeder reactor went to full power at Shippingport. (The power station was taken out of service October 1, 1982.)

1961 - The Tokens celebrated their first #1 hit single. The Lion Sleeps Tonight (Wimoweh for you purists) was a chart topper for four weeks in a row.

1965 - Gemini VII splashed down in the western Atlantic Ocean with command pilot Frank Borman and pilot Jim Lovell Jr. on board. They had blasted off Dec 4 on a mission of physiological testing and spacecraft performance evaluation.

1969 - The House of Commons abolished the death penalty for murder in Great Britain.

1972 - Helen Reddy received a gold record for the song that became an anthem for women’s liberation, I Am Woman. The song had reached number one on December 9, 1972.

1975 - Rod Stewart announced that he was leaving the group, Faces, and was going solo in a deal with Warner Brothers.

1976 - Wonder Woman debuted on ABC-TV. Based on Charles Moulton’s comic-book superheroine of the 1940s, the show developed gradually into a regular TV series. Wonder Woman was first seen as a TV movie in March 1974 (with Cathy Lee Crosby in the title role), then in another try in Nov 1975 (with Lynda Carter), then in a series of specials called The New Original Wonder Woman beginning in March 1976. The show that started this day had a short run through Jan 1977. In the fall of 1977, Wonder Woman moved to CBS-TV and became a regular series.

1977 - TV and film actor Cyril Ritchard (Peter Pan) died. He was 80 years old.

1980 - Former Soviet Premier Aleksey Nikolayevich Kosygin died at age 76. His death was not publicly announced for two days.

1981 - More Rod Stewart news: Stewart gave a concert at the Los Angeles Forum, which was televised to 23 countries and carried by FM radio stations in the US -- an audience of about 35 million.

1982 - Daryl Hall and John Oates reached the #1 spot on the music charts for the fifth time with Maneater. The song stayed in the top spot for four weeks, making it Hall and Oates’ most popular hit.

1984 - Christopher Guest of Saturday Night Live and actress Jamie Lee Curtis were married in the Los Angeles home of comedian Rob Reiner this day.

1985 - Beverly Hills Cop became the top movie grosser of the year with $229.9 million in tickets sold. Back to the Future, with Michael J. Fox, was second, followed by Rambo: First Blood, Part 2, starring Sylvester Stallone, gunning its way into third place.

1987 - Ivan F. Boesky was sentenced to three years in prison for plotting Wall Street’s biggest insider-trading scandal. (He served about two years of his sentence.)

1992 - Kim Young-sam was elected South Korea’s president. Kim’s victory returned the Korean presidency to a democratically-elected civilian president for the first time since the military coup d’etat of 1961.

1993 - Julio Cesar Chavez retained his WBC super lightweight title with a five-round victory over Britain’s Andy Holligan. It was the 27th time Chavez fought for a title without a loss since 1984, breaking Joe Louis’ record of 26.

1994 - Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter arrived in Bosnia and Herzegovina on a private mission to help find an end to 32 months of war.

1996 - TV industry executives agreed to adopt a ratings system. The TV-G, TV-PG, TV-14, TV-MA, TV-Y, TV-Y7 and TV-Y7-FV ratings began to appear in the upper left-hand corner of the screen on January 1, 1997.

1997 - A unique bridge-and-tunnel expressway across Tokyo Bay opened. The Trans-Tokyo Bay Motorway was named the Tokyo Bay Aqualine, a toll highway that spans the narrowest gap of Tokyo Bay. It opened to traffic this day, after 31 years of studies and construction at a total cost of 1.44 trillion yen (some $10.8 billion at the time). The 15-kilometer (9.3-mile) expressway, connecting Kisarazu City of Chiba Prefecture and Kawasaki City of Kanagawa Prefecture, makes it possible to make a round-trip of the bay by car. Of the total length, 4.4 kilometers (2.7 miles) from the Kisarazu side is a bridge and 9.5 kilometers (5.9 miles) from the Kawasaki side is an undersea tunnel, which is the world’s longest undersea tunnel, running 60 meters (197 feet) deep under the surface of the water.

1998 - These movies opened in the U.S.: The Prince of Egypt, starring the voices of Val Kilmer, Ralph Fiennes, Sandra Bullock, Jeff Goldblum, Michelle Pfeiffer, six original songs by Stephen Schwartz and a score by composer Hans Zimmer; Shakespeare in Love, which grabbed Academy Awards for Best Actress in a Leading Role (Gwyneth Paltrow), Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Judi Dench), Best Art Direction-Set Decoration (Martin Childs & Jill Quertier), Best Costume Design (Sandy Powell), Best Music, Original Musical or Comedy Score (Stephen Warbeck), Best Picture (Donna Gigliotti, Marc Norman, David Parfitt, Harvey Weinstein & Edward Zwick), and Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen (Marc Norman & Tom Stoppard); and You’ve Got Mail, with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan.

1999 - After living atop an ancient redwood in Humboldt County, California for two years (since Dec, 1997), environmental activist Julia ‘Butterfly’ Hill climbed down, ending her anti-logging protest.

2000 - The Electoral College voted, with President-elect George W. Bush receiving the expected 271 votes and winning the U.S. presidential election. Al Gore received 266 votes.

2000 - Newspaper heir Randolph Apperson Hearst, the last surviving son of William Randolph Hearst, died in New York. He was 85 years old.

2002 - The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers opened in the U.S.: “This Christmas the Journey Continues in the Two Towers.” The fantasy/adventure stars Elijah Wood as Frodo and Sean Astin as Sam. Also starring are Ian Mckellen, Liv Tyler, Viggo Mortensen, Cate Blanchett, John Rhys-Davies, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, Orlando Bloom, Christopher Lee and Hugo Weaving.

2002 - The National Basketball Association awarded Robert Johnson (the billionaire founder of Black Entertainment Television) the rights to the expansion team franchise in Charlotte, NC.

2003 - Lee Boyd Malvo, 18, was convicted in Virginia for his role in the 2002 sniper shootings around Washington, DC.

2003 - RealNetworks filed a U.S. federal anti-trust suit against Microsoft, alleging it has tried to use it monopoly power in PC operating systems to unlawfully dominate the digital media market. (A settlement was reached in 2005.)

2004 - United Nations climate-change talks in Buenos Aires ended with some progress, but the U.S., China, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia forced a halt to the European Union’s drive for deeper emissions cuts.

2005 - U.S. Vice President **** Cheney, on a trip to various countries including Oman, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, made a surprise stop in Iraq.

2006 - Legendary Hollywood animator Joseph Barbera died at 95 years of age. Barbera’s characters Fred and Wilma Flintstone and Scooby-Doo made generations of people laugh. The Television Academy Hall of Famer left MGM in 1957 to start Hanna-Barbera Studios (w/partner William Hanna). The studio produced popular cartoons such as Tom and Jerry, The Huckleberry Hound Show, The Flintstones, The Jetsons, and Scooby-Doo, as well as the musical film Charlotte’s Web.

2007 - Japan boasted that it had shot down a ballistic missile in space high above the Pacific Ocean. The test was part of joint efforts with the U.S. to erect a shield against a possible North Korean missle attack.

2007 - Pacific Gas and Electric Company announced plans to support the first commercial wave power plant off California’s Humboldt County coast. Eight power-generating buoys, were expected to begin operations in 2012.

2008 - 95-year old W. Mark Felt, former FBI second-in-command, died. In 2005, Felt had revealed himself to be the infamous ‘Deep Throat’, 30 years after he tipped off reporters to Watergate information that led to the resignation of U.S. President Richhard Nixon.

2009 - The infamous Nazi iron sign declaring "Arbeit Macht Frei," German for "Work Sets You Free," was stolen from the entrance of the former Auschwitz death camp in Poland. A former neo-Nazi leader, Anders Hogstrom of Sweden, later claimed that he organized the theft of the sign on behalf of a collector.